Optical fiber has electro-deposited thereon a metal body which permits the fiber to be mechanically acted upon by machining, positioning, or handling the metal body.
Fiber optic waveguides are small and fragile. It is important that the waveguides be firmly supported at least at their ends so that they can be ground and polished with facets or other surfaces which are optimum for coupling light into the fiber or for coupling the fiber with respect to another optical structure such as another optical fiber, a detector, or an integrated optic waveguide. In the past, epoxy adhesive has been employed for attaching a fiber optic waveguide to a surface for the purpose of building a coupling device for the end of the fiber, including polishing of the fiber end. One of the problems of this attachment is that the dimensional changes in the hardening epoxy adhesive cause external forces on the fiber optic waveguide. These forces cause microbending in the optical fiber resulting in significant signal losses. Microbending, localized changes in the optical fiber's index of refraction, must be minimized in order to maximize the signal and the signal-to-noise ratio. Thus, there is need for a structure which can be built up onto an optical fiber to permit handling of the optical fiber and to permit machining and otherwise processing the end of the optical fiber to enhance coupling and the like.